


Ophelia Study No. 1

by thehotinpsychotic



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-10
Updated: 2015-07-10
Packaged: 2018-02-24 20:04:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 21,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2594729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thehotinpsychotic/pseuds/thehotinpsychotic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A toxic romance for all the ages.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

I pushed through the biting cold of Chicago, walking swiftly as the wind struck my back. It was four forty-five p.m. and twenty two degrees out, and the thought that Mr. Bruder had the audacity to hold me after class had yet to sink in.  

He had kept me after the bell to make me retake a test, which took about fifteen minutes, making me miss my bus by a long shot. Sure, if I would had studied for the damned thing in the first place I wouldn't be in that predicament, but that was besides the point. Who could honestly expect me to take time out of my busy schedule to review the Korean War? Faced with two options and two options only, option one being to beg forgiveness to my mother and have her pick me up, and option two being to walk home, risking hypothermia or even fatality in the dead of winter in the bustling city. I chose within seconds, leaving me wandering the frostbitten sidewalks, looking for any sort of shelter.

The first open business I came across was an adult shop. You know, the kind that boys in your grade would go in, only to be removed by management within twenty minutes.

I used to frequent the bank; my mother would stop there every Friday and Tuesday to make a deposit after school. The bank was right across from the sex store, so I made a hobby out of watching all of the customers that ventured into the scary world of artificial pleasure and automatic eroticism.

I’d seen quite a few oddballs go in, but by far the strangest occurrence was the time I caught Mrs. Mahone go inside.

She was our neighbor to the left of us, and she hadn’t noticed our blatantly traceable station wagon parked in plain sight just across the street. She may not have seen me, but I certainly saw her. She only spent about two minutes in there, which means that she went in knowing exactly what was looking for. She had reemerged onto the street clutching a small dandelion yellow bag, perfectly sized for one object in particular.

Tommy Mahone’s mother bought a dildo.  

She had briskly stridden over to her car, her cheeks flushed, not from the cold, but from the shame of purchasing a vibrating penis mold.

I was desperate, but not in _that_ way. I marched on, ducking into a green building whose sign I don’t take the time to read.

The store had a nice, homey feel to it. I was packed in cozily, flanked by shelves of books upon walking a mere few feet. The air smelled faintly of fabric softener, an aroma I associated with memories of being a young child and sitting on the dryer, watching with curiosity as my mother did the laundry. The scent was comforting and familiar, and when you’re a teenager and you and your life is constantly changing and developing, it’s nice to step back to previously treaded grounds.

I wandered aimlessly for a while, shuffling my legs together with each step, trying to bring some warmth to them. I figured that I should at least pretend to be interested in the books, so as make my way through the aisles, I occasionally stopped at a section, filing through books with a forced interest. I went so far as to pick one up, examining it for a few acted moments before placing it where it had come from. I’m not exactly sure why I decided to stay, what I had intended to do in the bookstore is completely unknown to me. I had to be home by five thirty by whatever means necessary, but those means weren’t going to be hanging around in some store looking lost.

I opted to leave, but only after my toes were thawed enough to wiggle them in the upper slope of my shoes. I was heading for the door when my eye is caught by a copy of my favorite novel, a contemporary piece titled Snow Days.

That book was my lifeline all throughout middle school, my only solace in a world of simultaneous ugliness and beauty. I had clung to it like a child to a monkey bar, desperately and helplessly so. The story was all about adolescence, all about the emotional backaches of growing up. It wasn’t a coming of age story that you’d find at your school library, no. They may have the common theme of growing up, but Snow Days went about their message in a much different way, through tales of heartache and woe, fear and innocence, pessimism and false trust. It was everything that was wrong in the world compiled into 248 pages, and it was undoubtedly the best thing to ever happen to me.

I slipped a hand into my pocket, fingering at the bills present with contemplation. I tried to come up with a single good reason not to buy it, and my only excuse was that I already owned one copy, a dog eared, worn, thoroughly used copy. The margins were tattooed with the scrawling of wistful poetry and pleas to God. The most profound parts in the book, profound being a personalized term, seeing as a significant line falls on nearly every page, were highlighted in orange magic marker, staining through the pages.

I elected to give the business 8.99 for their troubles, not including tax of course. I pushed through the maze of books, approaching the front desk with a steady stride.

The stride disappeared, along with my confidence, when the cashier appeared from behind the back room, standing behind the counter. She didn’t even see me; she was too busy fumbling with her nametag, which I tried to read, but from my distance, could only make out a few incoherent blurs. She still failed to notice me, and her mannerisms proved this; she immediately set her elbow up onto the counter, laying her cheek across her forearm.

On wobbling knees, I dragged myself to the counter, clearing my throat subtly.

Her eyes flickered up to meet mine, and she snapped to a standing position, running a hand through her dark bangs. “My apologies. Did you find everything okay?”

     Her voice was like velvet, pleasant and almost melting against my eardrums. 

     I nodded, setting my book onto the spot where she had rested moments ago.

     She picked up the novel, briefly reading the title, but trying to pretend like she didn’t. She punched in the price on the back sticker, informing, “That’s $9.82, please.”

     With shaking hands, I passed over the money. Our fingers brushed against each other, and I had to fight off the instinct to clasp hands with her. I withdrew my hand sharply, so sharply that she furrowed her brows. I stuffed the offending limb into my pocket, casting my eyes to the floor.

     “Your change is thirteen cents,” she chirped. I held out my palm wordlessly, feeling the coins transfer from her hand to mine. “Would you like a bag?”

     I shook my head, muttering softly, “That’s okay.”

     She set the book before me, glancing again at the cover. She raised her brows, telling enthusiastically, “You’ll like this one, it’s really good.”

     I wanted nothing more than to engage her in conversation over what was most definitely my favorite book to ever be printed, but my shy personality held me back, the fear of her laughing at me overwhelming the thought of her laughing with me. “Thanks.” I turned quickly, bee lining for the door.

     By the time I reached my home and was safe and sound in my room, door locked and window open, I fell back onto my mattress.

     I had blown it.


	2. Chapter 2

I have this really inconvenient habit, this tendency to read too far into what is said to me. Ms. Gilbert, our psychology teacher, assured us that this was normal, that all teenagers show a narcissistic personality, so much so that we over analyze things that may somehow affect us. This causes us to put a lot of thought into things that don’t really matter, which is an uncontrollable, unmanageable waste of time that could be better spent. 

     It is this egotistical, self-centered behavior that drives me up the wall.

     I couldn’t help but try to decipher what that cashier had meant during our short conversation.

     I actually wouldn’t even go so far as to call it a conversation; a lot of what she had said to me was merely protocol, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she’d said those words over a dozen times in the past hour alone. I wish I could’ve believed she was just doing her job.

     But it’s never that simple, is it? No, one has to take into account her body language, including her posture, her eye movements, and her use or lack of gesticulation. I could even consider the tone of her voice and her inflection, picking apart syllable by syllable to discover any underlying sarcasm or spite. I didn’t stress over it to that extent, but I’d be lying if I said I slept easy that night.

     Over the course of the next few days, she was on my mind. The what ifs and should haves pulled on me like a nagging child on a mother’s sleeve, begging for attention, pleading for some thoughts to go their way. It’s highly unadvisable to ponder the possibilities of alternate outcomes of events from the past, because that’s a one way trip down a bad road. But that doesn’t mean that it’s easy not to.

     I searched for her at school, scanning the halls each time for silky dark hair and soft eyes. I figured it was a long shot that I’d find her here; I know of at least twenty-four high schools in that city. For all I knew, she could’ve gone to Kuempen.

     Kuempen is a Catholic school not too far from my own East Valley high, notorious for raising assholes on the basis of “I go to church so I’m not going to hell”. It has tuition of 3 grand and uniforms requiring shudder inducing khaki pants or skirts, yet rich kids continue to flock there to avoid going to public school. The truth is, when you go to Kuempen, you’re no better than a public school kid.

     After a mere two days, I cracked, meaning that I decided I _had to_ go back to that bookstore. What I needed was closure, not her. I needed to know that there was either a chance or no hope between us, and either one would it would be the last time, like a first time heroin addict heading back to mother’s milk for that initial relief.

     I skipped the bus in order to get there, knowing that I’d regret this on the frigid walk home. But right at that moment, it didn’t really matter, and my shaking hands and restless heart kept me warm anyways.

     The bell atop the door announced my entrance, resonating highly despite the small space of the business. I glanced behind the counter, and seeing that she wasn’t there, promptly exited, walking home with the tremors fading.

     You would think that’d be the last time, a sure sign from the gods that it was simply not meant to be. Whether it’s due to the fact that I was a prophet, or that I merely fail to pick up the obvious, I crawled back again, as soon as the next day.

     It was a particularly cold afternoon, and I don’t just mean cold, I mean Chicago cold. The wind was giving its worse, and the snow pummeling down onto my parka, the flakes being absorbed the moment they reach the coat.

     When I reached my destination, I wasn’t entirely surprised to see that she was again not there. I pushed down the possibility of her quitting her job, repressing the idea that I’d never see her again. I didn't want to meet another girl. I didn't want to look longingly at my brand new copy of Snow Days every so often and sigh at the thought of her. I didn't want to move on. I couldn't forget her. I wanted to make myself a part of her life; I wanted her to trust me. 

     Nevertheless, I roamed the aisles with little purpose, again using the store as a shield against the brutal winter. I stopped every few shelves to read a title, occasionally even the back, before replacing the book and proceeding with my wandering.

     As I passed by the register, the cashier, a black teen who looked to be my age, asked, “Can I help you with anything?”

     “Um…” I muttered. I tucked my hands into my coat pockets, curling my fingernails into my palms silently. The boy was staring at me, not with menace or judgment, but out of concern.

     “Are you here for an application?” he questioned, gesturing to the stack of papers at the left hand corner of the desk.

     I replied before I could process the question, answering, “Yes.” I headed over to him, and he handed me an application, pen and clipboard, explaining that I could fill it out there if I’d like.

     I sat in the back pocket of the store, still unsure as to why I lied. Maybe it was because I’d had hopes of meeting her through the job, or perhaps it was just that I was anxious and didn’t know what else to say. After all, I’ve never been known for my interpersonal skills.

     I completed the form before I could think too hard, handing it back to the guy and leaving. He told me good luck, assuring that I had a good shot at the job. I had brushed it off, walking home with the wind singing. 


	3. Chapter 3

It’s within hours of waking I realized I’d made a terrible mistake in applying for a job. What was I thinking? I have a terrible work ethic.

In that succeeding afternoon I go back to the bookstore, planning to cancel the application. I figured I could make something up about how I’d joined a sports team or my mom admonished that I was too busy, some total lie akin to those excuses.

I drove myself over in my mother’s car, having lied that I needed to pick up a book for a class (I even had a twenty stuffed into my pocket in case she went so far as to ask to see the book I purchased). Turning up empty handed would’ve raised questions in itself.

I parked across the street for no real reason other than the unfortunate fact that a soccer mom had cut off my entrance into the bookstore parking lot.

For the first time in three trips, I actually took note of the store’s sign, which read ‘Hearse Bookstore’ in a cluttered typewriter font. At the time, the name was anything but fitting, but it grew to be the perfect name for her work, in the respect that she ended up being the closest thing to death I knew.

The bell clanged loudly, greeting me for what felt like the millionth time in the past week or so. Ironically, the one time that I wasn’t expecting her to be there, she was there.

            I had spotted her without even meaning to, my eyes instantly being drawn to the front counter where she stood, rattling her fingertips against the marbled top.

            My knees had just about given out, and I ducked behind a shelf, grabbing it for support. My palms were sweating and my heart raced. She was the only girl to ever make my body reject the notion of her mere presence.

            I took a while to regain my composure, and once that was intact I had approached her, trying to use heavy footsteps to warn her that I was there and I was coming.

            She’d looked up, and I almost fell to pieces. Instead, I was able to lean against the counter (not by choice, mind you), and calmly ask,

            “I’m here to cancel an application I sent in the other day, is there any way I could do that?”

            “I’d have to talk to my manager, but I’m sure it’s feasible,” she responded. “He’s not here right now, but he will be in about ten minutes, if you don’t mind waiting.”

            “Sure,” I agreed, unable to pull together any more coherent words.

            She cocked her head, almost sizing me up with her almond eyes. “You look familiar. Have you been here before?”

            It was not very often that I was presented with a choice in the field of Emily May Kimura, so I took as much advantage as I could of my discretion. I weighed my options for what seemed like centuries, but in reality was a few seconds. I could’ve started off with a fresh start, claiming no recollection of her or the store, or I could’ve told her the truth, reminding her of my utter failure as a person when she had sold me a book.

            Why I chose the second path, I have no idea. Besides, fresh starts turn into bad blood quickly in my experience.

            “I was in here earlier this week, I bought Snow Days.”

            She stopped, trying to recollect that day. She stood quietly for what seemed like a long time, long enough to make me doubt if she remembered me at all. Eventually, she grinned, asking, “Have you started it yet?”

            “I’ve actually already read it,” I confessed. “I bought my second copy here.”

            She chuckled, raising one eyebrow and questioning, “You bought your _second_ copy here?”

            She was still giggling as I mumbled a ‘yes’. I could feel the heat rise to my cheeks, and knowing that I was blushing violently, tucked my head down and pretended to scratch my cheek.

            “Why would you want to own more than one?” she challenged. “I mean, the book’s good, but it’s not that good.”

            I’d shuffled my feet anxiously, toeing the base of the counter, which protruded from the carpet like a tree’s roots from soil. “I dunno, really. I…” I’m still proud of myself for having been able to make eye contact at that moment as I confided, “I needed an excuse to talk to you.”

            She pursed her lips, and that eyebrow remained uprooted as creases formed in her forehead. “You needed an _excuse_ to talk to me?”

            Realizing how insulting my previous statement had sounded, I stammered, “N-n-no, of-of course not. It- it just came out wrong.”

            “How did you mean for it to come out?” she asked. She leaned over the counter, smiling at me.

            “You were…” I began. Ducking my head, I continued, “You were absolutely beautiful. I didn’t have the guts to tell you that.”

            “Why the sudden change of heart?” she questioned.

I shrugged as I admitted, “I’m an Aires, very stubborn.” I gazed up at her, choosing my words carefully. “I don’t change for just anyone.”

That was the smoothest thing I’d ever say to a girl. She would’ve agreed by the way she reacted. She started to blush and got all flustered, dragging her elbow back over to her side of the counter and knocking over some small display.

I corrected her mistake, piling up the pamphlets and readjusting the sign. She went to help, her hands meeting mine. Sparks didn’t fly, no electricity passed between our fingertips. That should’ve been my first clue that something wasn’t right.

The application did end up getting cancelled, and thankfully so, as I later found that a service job was completely unsuitable for my personality type. She had given me her number; she even typed it into my phone herself. As a result, she had the power to choose her own contact name. That is where the girls play up the flirting, leaving behind x’s and o’s after their name or a colon closed parentheses that somewhat resembles a smiley face. She had merely put Emily. Another bad omen lay in that contact name, what I considered at the time to be a personal preference turned out to be a general hesitance from the start of our relationship. Sure, she had loved to talk me up and twist me around her finger, but the moment I asked for any contact information is when she grew ambivalent.

Looking back, red flags had littered our relationship, so much that I’m surprised I hadn’t broken up with her before things got any worse. I had surely noticed them, the way that she’d frown at me when I said something I shouldn’t, or when I’d catch her kissing with her eyes open. I must’ve brushed them off, excited to really, actually be in love.

Or maybe just willing to pretend.


	4. Chapter 4

We were an item from the start. What would you expect, it’s exactly what I was looking for, and while I wasn’t sure what she wanted, I couldn’t really care. I was a teenager, and egocentric was my middle name. I didn’t lack empathy, but I lacked sacrifice. I didn’t care, it didn’t matter. I came first and that was what was really important.

We met up in a coffee shop, this little place tucked away in an alley just off West Hancock Street. There we would fuel up before our trudges to school, combating fatigue with caffeine, and in the end creating more stress than there ever was to begin with. It was over coffee that we would tell about our nights, and sometimes she’d admit she had a rough one, and I’d rub her thigh underneath the table. We admitted our dreams and confessed our fears. At that time, she believed in God and myself, karma. We clung to 11:11 prayers with a relentless grip and a refusal to face reality. We had so much growing up to do.

That was when she used to finish her homework and comb her hair, when she listened to her parents and went to church. It was when she used to give a damn.

It was in that period that she asked me to meet her family. I was caught off guard; she’d asked me within weeks of dating. There wasn’t much I could do, not an awful lot of things to say, so I figured it would just be best to agree; that was back when I still cared about making her happy.

And happy I made her. I wore a suit coat and tie to her house, the blazer being the only one I owned, and the tie a recent purchase exclusively for the occasion. I think it’s currently buried under my bed somewhere.

Her home was nothing like what I was used to. Her baby pictures decorated the walls, so many so that I couldn’t turn my head without facing a younger version of my Emily. The house was stripped of all odors, the only scent a slight fragrance of lavender and mint. It was weird for a house to smell like that; over the years I had grown used to pet odors and pancake syrup, fresh cut grass and sweat. To be completely submersed in such an aroma was unsettling, just as any unfamiliarity is.

She had given me a hug for the first time. I wasn’t sure if she had meant it or if she was just playing it up for her parents, and I still don’t know.

It was a short lived night. Her father asked me if I was on the football team, and only seemed a little disappointed when I told him I wasn’t. Her mother would ask me about my grades, and I could lie easily that I was on the honor roll.

Her little brother kicked me beneath the table, and her sister had stolen glances when she thought I wasn’t looking. Her family was easily the most basic, default assemblage I had ever encountered. Her father read the paper, her mother did the dishes, her brother knocked things over, and her sister stood off to the side. Where did Emily fit into the mix? I couldn’t figure it out, and it was unimaginable to not have a predetermined role within your own kin.

It must’ve been suffocating to live in that house. I had really felt truly sorry for her, and it was in knowing her that I got to understanding what empathy really was.

At the end of the night, Emily walked me to the door, again hugging me. I could tell by the way that she licked her lips and bit them, her tooth catching on a bit of dry skin, that what she really wanted was to kiss me.

I had walked out to my car alone, sitting for a few minutes to allow it to warm up. It was then when Emily had tapped on my window, leaning into my car as I rolled it down. She’d grabbed me by the tie and planted a kiss on my lips, a shy, quick peck with her mouth closed. She had blushed nonetheless before waving and running back inside before her parents found out.

The kiss was uneventful, her delivery felt like I was kissing my sister. I didn’t even have any siblings, yet I could use them as a negative comparison because that’s how bad it really was. Her lips were taut and firm, almost completely rigid. It was like kissing a wall, which was another area I had no experience in, but could imagine it felt close. Worst of all, I had caught a glimpse of her with her eyes open wide, unwavering and plain.

I had brushed it off, all too aware of the fact that the kiss had most likely been her first.

She wasted a lot of her firsts on me. The more I realize that, the more sorry I truly am. 


	5. Chapter 5

Had I known more about myself as a teenager, a lot of lives would’ve been spared. Instead, I shut myself up in my room because I wasn’t good enough. And while self-discovery can be internal, most of it doesn’t happen holed up in your room twelve hours a day.

  
One thing in particular comes to mind that would’ve been useful to know three years ago. That fact is that while I’m quick to fall in love, I’m also quick to fall out of it.  
And my, did I fall.

  
We began to be together more and more, and the more I saw her, the less I wanted to. She was the type of person that was wonderful, almost other worldly in moderation, but fatal in large doses.

  
I overdosed on Emily Kimura.

  
I started to notice the tiniest things about her, and these little details would drive me crazy, and not in a good way. For instance, she would push her tongue into her bottom row of teeth when she laughed. It really annoyed me for some reason, and I almost avoided making her laugh just to prevent that from happening. That and whenever there was silence, she would hum to herself. Except you could hear it. It was always some outdated song, and I was tempted to tell her how loud and obnoxious she was being whenever she dared to hum in front of me. It was trivial, stupid, totally insignificant things that pissed me off. It shouldn’t have bothered me as much as it did, but that Emily had a way of getting under your skin. She was a guerrilla terrorist in the most advanced form of combat, your head. She could get in there and, within seconds, reduce everything around her into rubble. Want to hear the best part? She’d resurface unscathed, ready to carry on her business elsewhere.

  
I stopped feeling sorry for her, I really did. I realized that while she had a shitty, mundane life, she did absolutely nothing about it. I’d offer to take her to a movie, she’d decline. I’d try to slip my hand up her skirt and she’d make me stop, and I gave her a cigarette and she pushed it away. Whenever things got interesting, she got scared. She was unhappy with the way things were, but unwilling to make any changes. It frustrated me to no end that she could sit there and complain about her problems but make no effort to resolve anything.  
She didn’t notice that I was growing bored of her, and quickly, too. She would talk for what seemed like forever, and sure, I would hear her, but no way would I listen. Just being around her got to be so mundane that I would find myself counting ceiling tiles or solving equations in my head just to escape her dreadful aurora.

  
This is also the point of the story where my vice starts to show. I knew I was getting tired of her, knew that I didn’t care for her nearly as intensely as I once had. Call it a character flaw or what you will, but despite these looming facts, I proceeded to date her. Not just date her, but I mean really make this girl fall in love with me. It happened by accident, almost, except I take responsibility. I don't know when I made the conscious decision to continue dating her; I guess that in my world, breaking up was never really an option. 

  
I remember one night in particular, the one where we had a movie marathon. It wasn’t much of a marathon, though, seeing as we watched three movies and she fell asleep before midnight. It was the closest I’d gotten to her, sharing a bed. We were fully clothed; I recall her not even wanting to take her shoes off. She also wasn’t a fan of touching; she rested a full foot or so in front of me, and whenever I’d rest my hand on her hip of run my fingertips along her thigh, her muscles would tense and I’d give up, only for ten minutes or so. I was hardly persistent in anything I did, so it was surprising just how determined I was to touch her, and to get her to like it.

  
The end credits of our movie were rolling, and she had said softly, “I love you. I didn’t think I would, honestly, but I really do.”

  
Brushing off her back handed sentiment, I had remained quiet, now rubbing my hand up and down her back softly. Bracing myself for her muscles to clench, I was stunned to feel her back relaxed under my touch. I had thought that I gently bullied her into submission, but now I believe that she had genuinely trusted me. Mistakes happen I suppose.  
“You love me back, right?” she had asked, craning her neck to face me.

I refused to meet her eyes, deciding it was best not to tell her the truth. She wouldn’t be able to handle it, and in saying nothing, it implied a sort of mystery rather than blatant rejection. I would rather keep her guessing than have her crying.

  
She didn’t say much for the rest of the night. She eventually fell asleep, her lashes full and heavy. I ran a hand through her hair absently, recognizing for the first time that I was in deep.


	6. Chapter 6

            I don’t know why I had kept dating her. Whether it was out of sympathy, or complete gluttony, I still don’t know. What I do know is that I would never do anything to harm her intentionally, and whenever I did hurt her, it wasn’t on purpose. She wasn’t my world, but she also wasn’t my hell. She was simply purgatory. There was a stage in the relationship where I was utterly indifferent to every aspect of her, and I was surprised that she wasn’t able to figure it out. Maybe even she was just trying to get what she wanted out of the relationship, and she was willing to ignore whatever stood in her way. Out of sight, out of mind, as they say.

            What did I want from her? Take a minute and consider the context. I was an eighteen year old virgin, a high school senior that had barely been so much as kissed. I wasn’t aching for love, I was aching for sex. It hadn’t started that way, but that’s inevitably what it turned into, what it always came back to. Looking back, I wish I’d gotten it over with and dumped her, breaking her heart for a mere few days and sparing her the long run. I should have found the drunkest girl at some party to fulfill my little fantasies with. That was all I needed, one good fuck.

            And for a long time, she wouldn’t give it to me. I did see her change though, I watched her almost go backwards, not from adolescence to infancy, but from maturity to helplessness. Besides a number of changes, her grades dropped, but she wouldn’t tell me. It’s not all her fault though; I was sneaking over to her house at least four times a week at ungodly hours.

            I’d throw pebbles at her window, just like in the eighties movies. The small rocks were loud enough to wake up her, but not so loud as to wake up her old man. She’d show up at the window, all smiles and bedhead. Motioning to the front door, she’d creep down the steps, letting me in through the kitchen glass door since it was the quietest one in the house.

            We’d go back up to her bedroom, where she’d shove her stuffed animals off the mattress to clear a spot for me. I would almost always end up smoking a cigarette; no matter how many times she’d ask me not to, insisting that her father would smell it.

            It was on one of those nights that Emily smoked for the first time.

            I can’t tell you what the date was, but I do know that it was a Thursday morning, around three a.m. to be precise. The only reason I can recall these details is because earlier that day I had been stressing out over my Algebra test, and still was, so I’d been smoking _a lot_ that night, almost to the point of sickness.

            It was after my third or fourth cigarette that she’d asked, “Those… those don’t taste good, do they?”

            “It grows on you.” I’d gazed over at her, taking a long drag. Blowing the smoke out of the left corner of my mouth, I’d leaned forward, extending my hand holding the cigarette. “Want to try it?”

            She had hesitated. She didn't want to smoke the cigarette, or at least that's what she said. Even though she was the picture perfect good girl American portrait, I could almost tell that she wanted to. In every saint, there's a twinge of temptation. They don't always follow it, but it's still there. “I… gee, I don’t know. My dad-”

            “Your old man’s fast asleep,” I reminded. She was as white as a ghost, and I couldn’t help but laugh. I cupped a hand around her jaw, making her eyes meet mine. “Don’t be a good girl for once. Step away from that and see how you like it.”

            She chuckled, rolling her eyes and muttering, “All right, I won’t be a good girl.” She had taken it from me, trying to play it off as though her entire hand wasn’t trembling. Bringing the shaking cigarette to her lips, she’d looked at me with those doe eyes, almost for reassurance. I stone walled her, showing no emotion. She always stood too close to me. If she wanted to be happy, if she wanted things to change, smoking wasn’t the solution, but it was a starting point, something that she had to initiate on her own.

            She inhaled slowly, holding the smoke for only a few seconds before coughing it all out, clouds of smoke sputtering from between her lips. She looked even paler than she had a minute ago, and I was considering taking the cigarette from her when she planted it back into her mouth. As it quivered, ashes dropped off onto the bed, smudging her lilac sheets to a shabby pinkish grey.

            She had released her next mouthful with much more grace, the smoke swirling over her head and tracing her features. She’d smiled, admitting, “I kind of like it.” She handed it back, her fingers pinched tightly around it. “It was a little weird though.”

            “You get used to it,” I’d responded.

            She’d grinned again, her lips slightly pursed as they upturned. She’d leaned forward slowly, closing her eyes. Anticipating what was about to happen, I kept mine open, being the one to make sure we didn’t bang heads as she moved in for the kiss.

            Her lips were soft, much softer than they’d looked. They were almost buttery, god help me. Mine were chapped to the point of being bloody half the time, and I became self-conscious for no real reason besides that.

            Bringing a hand through her hair, tangling it only slightly, I tried my hardest to relax, to be in the moment. There I was, getting what I was shooting for, that first kiss. She’d smoked a cigarette for me, little National Honors Society Emily Kimura. She could forfeit her spot in the National Honors Society if she ever got caught smoking.The least I could do was pay attention while kissing her.

            But I couldn’t for the life of me. I was barely able to notice that my eyes were open; I was so out of it. I can’t even remember a single thing I had thought about while kissing her, that beautiful girl. I never really appreciated her until she was gone, and that’s something that haunts me to this day.

            The kissing evolved into open mouthed, and I don’t recall how long that lasted and was probably never capable of doing so in the first place. The only thing I’m sure of is that I departed through the clanging front door for the first time. Emily was becoming careless. 


	7. Chapter 7

The whole front door thing was an eye opener. To most people, something that trivial wouldn't matter; they'd brush it off. But I knew better; I knew Emily, and I knew that when she struggled, she didn't scream, only kicked. She could suffer and fight in quiet silence before ever drawing attention to herself. If she was losing it, it wouldn't be very apparent, so the front door was the first real hint I took that something wasn’t right, that Emily wasn’t being herself. There very well could have been more hints that had flown under my radar, but I didn't know for sure. What I did know was that the girl who was once afraid to let me touch her had allowed me to leave past three in the morning through the main door of her parents’ house.

       She started smoking regularly, getting cigarettes from God knows where. Usually she’d just borrow some of mine. When Emily "borrowed" cigarettes, that meant she smoked them but never replaced them. It annoyed me to no end; if I had a dollar for every time I went for a smoke and had a freshly cleaned out pack, I'd have enough cash to buy her a damn carton. Eventually, she started to produce her own Marlboro Greens as opposed to my Reds.

       She asked me to hold them for her sometimes, confiding that her parents had started to get suspicious. That’s when she admitted to her grades falling with a shrug. I only reinforced her behavior, having agreed, “Hey, shit happens.”

        Her parents began to searching her room, for what, I don’t know. Had they started the ransacking spontaneously, then they most likely would’ve found one of her packs of smokes. But because they warned her in advance, the worst thing they found was a journal entry showing mild dissatisfaction with her English teacher.

       She told me all this with a smile on her face. “They told me they’re looking again next Wednesday. I doubt they actually know how room searches are supposed to work.”

       “If they can’t figure out Facebook, they probably can’t work out basic discipline,” I had smirked. It was funny to me, the inadequacy with which her parents handled her. Looking back, I know that she was changing, and her parents were desperately trying to keep up. 

       She was smoking, taking breath after breath of tobacco. When she kissed me, it felt like I was chewing a cigarette. Still, I couldn’t get enough of it.

       I found myself liking the new Emily a lot more than I did the old. It was probably due to the fact that she became more like me, for better or for worse. Over the next few months, it was definitely confirmed that she had changed for the worst.

       She fell deeper into her depression, which would make her smoke more, which would make her feel bad about herself and drag her right back to square one. I got a lot of teary 2 a.m. phone calls, and I would usually just set the phone off to the side and ad lib reassurance without really listening. I wish I would’ve handled it better, but I didn’t. I feel like if I had, a lot of things would be different now.

       But I didn't so they aren't. I ignored her when I needed her most, and why? Because I was tired of her. I stopped showing any effort in the relationship, stopped sneaking over to her house, quit trying to touch her, ceased in actually showing any empathy or affection for her at all. I didn't loathe her like I used to, and I liked her most of the time, but when she was down, she was really down, and I would do all that I could to stay high. She could probably tell just how bad I was in comforting her, but it didn’t stop her from dating me or from calling me up at all hours of the night. I think it’s because she had no one else to turn to, nowhere else to go.

       It was on a February night that she lost her virginity to me.

       She had been the one to initiate it. It was seemingly out of the blue, but now that I think deeper into it, she was probably trying to get me to fall for her again. Her naive mind equated love with fucking.

       So she dragged me into her car, her hair smelling of stale cigarettes and lips chapped and dry. We parked in a vacant lot. She had neglected to turn off the radio as she started kissing me. I don't remember what song was playing now, but I remember that in that moment, I had thought it perfectly suitable.

       It was 1:42 p.m. on a Wednesday night. We were out past curfew, and we surely would’ve been in a heap of trouble had we been caught. She didn’t seem to care; in fact, she was the most  at ease I’d seen her in weeks.

       She was all skin and bones, obviously having lost weight since she started smoking. Throughout it, she had this glazed over look in her eye, a sort of emptiness that was unfathomable. It was a clue, and it was one that I refused to investigate.

       After, we had laid in her car, wrapped up in each other to combat the cold. She combed her fingers through my hair absently, and she asked me if I really loved her. This time, I answered. I replied with a dull no.

    I had finally told her the truth, and perhaps at a bad time, but nonetheless, now she knew for sure, knew that I didn’t care if she woke up the next morning, that it didn’t matter if she got home that night. Maybe the timing was off, maybe we were incompatible, or maybe I had some fatal flaw that disabled any capacity I had to love anyone but myself. Whatever the reason, I didn't love her. I had come to grips with that a long time ago, and while a small part of her had always feared that to be true, she was staring it in the face for the first time.

       She started crying, her tiny body shaking beneath me. I buried her head into my chest, unsure of what else to do. I didn’t do much else to comfort her. It’s hard to break a girl’s heart and then be her shoulder to cry on. She probably didn’t even want to be around me, which she proved by pushing away whenever I tried to move her closer. 

       She had sobbed, “I thought you cared about me.”

       What comes next is perhaps what I regret the most in my short time with her. It's not my proudest moment by any means; it's something that I wouldn't want anyone to know about. I still have trouble living it down. I had leaned into her ear, whispering, “You haven’t thought that for a while now.”

       She walked home, and I let her, in the blistering cold. I didn’t give her as much as a gesture in the right direction. The fact that she was willing to leave her car there, with me in it, keys in the ignition, engine running, not even worried about getting it back, proves how desperate she was to get away from me.

       To think she’d come back a week later.


	8. Chapter 8

 

            I figured she was done with me. After how I’d treated her, I would be lying if I said I expected her to ever come back. To this day, I still can’t think of a logical reason as to how she ended up in her old place under my thumb. She'd been gone for such a short time it was still warm. Pressed tightly under my will, it must not have been too degrading or uncomfortable by her standards; she never objected. 

            It was less than a week later than I heard muffled pings against my window. Gazing out from bed, I had been able to make out nothing but night sky. The moment I had rolled over, the taps persisted, carrying on for minutes and annoying me to the point that I got out of bed. Stumbling in the darkness to my window, I opened it loudly, squinting out before me.

            “Down here.”

            Peering below me, I saw no one else but Emily Kimura, shivering in the cold. Her coat was pulled tightly around her as she trembled, her glasses reflecting the falling snow. “Can I come in?”

            We sat down at my dinner table. Neither of us cared what would happen if my mother woke up, and I knew for a fact that she slept like a brick. It’d take a lot more than two teenagers talking to wake her up.

            I’d asked, “What are you doing here?”

            She seemed hurt; she almost flinched at my cold regard. What can I say, I could’ve worded it better, but at that point in time, Emily’s feelings were at the bottom of my list of concerns. “I… I needed to talk to you.”

            I leaned forward. “So talk.”

            She’d chuckled uneasily, brushing a strand of hair from her eyes. I stonewalled her, barely even blinking as I stared her down, only strengthening her apparent discomfort. “I’m sorry about the other night…”

            “You mean when you walked out on me?” Of course, it was totally like me to paint her as the bad guy.

            “Yeah, about that,” she’d proceeded, her voice small. “I’m really sorry. I’d like for us to stay together.”

            “Why?”

            The question came out as harsh as everything else I’d said to her, but this time, it didn’t really bother her, no; she didn’t even blink. She sat there, wordlessly, not even looking at me; her eyes cast low to the ground, lashes full and dark. She was utterly disgusted.

            I never got an answer. She returned to my arms the following day as though nothing had happened, pretending that everything was fine. But everything wasn’t; I hadn’t merely broken her heart, no, I’d ripped it to bloody pieces with my bare hands and was then manipulating the ribbons left of it, tying them and twisting them however I liked. And she let me. She was unarguably the biggest doormat I had ever met. If she would’ve had the slightest of a backbone, it might’ve saved her. There would still be harm done, but there would no longer be a casualty in the war that was our relationship.

            We spent our afternoons lounging around in vacant lots, listening to whatever was on the radio, and smoking. I wish I could say that we had deep discussions of our hopes and fears like we used to at the coffee shop, but we didn’t. Really all we did was silently lie there until it was time to go home, which was whenever Emily got all weepy and sad for no apparent reason. That was my signal to drop her off at her driveway with only a pat on the back.

            It was one night that she told me she hated me. I can’t remember hardly anything about it; I had been smoking marijuana that night along with a bit of beer, which ran through my bloodstream as I drove her home. I had the audacity to be behind the wheel of a car not only high but buzzed, and with not only myself in danger but her. She didn’t complain, at least I don’t think she did.

            All I can clearly recall her telling me is, “I hate you. I tried to tell myself I didn’t, tried to make nice. But I really do hate you.”

            I think I kicked her out of the car without a word. When I unlocked the door, she had looked at me with her big copper eyes, pleading for some understanding. I opened the car door, letting the flurries blow into the interior. She refused to move, holding her gaze with me.

            I had grabbed her by the upper arm, pulling her from the backseat. She screamed, screamed and started to cry. I managed to bring her to the front of the car, despite the fact that she was literally kicking and screaming. She clung to me like crazy, but I was able to shove her out into the snow.

            In the haziness of that night, the one thing I will never forget is what happened next. She had been staring at me, her eyes watery and swollen and tears freezing to her cheeks. She looked right at me and said, “You used to mean so much to me.”

            I drove off, kicking up slush as I sped towards home.          


	9. Chapter 9

It was within the next week that Emily Kimura was expelled from her prestigious Catholic school.

            She had told me all about it in tears over the phone. She hadn’t spoken to me all that week, not since the night I shoved her out of my car. Then, bam, something went wrong, and there she was, sobbing over the phone, not even  knowing that she was back in my arms.

            I lay there in my bed, only half listening. However, I was paying enough attention to pick up the reason for her expulsion, being caught smoking in the girls’ room.

            “Wait, you got _expelled_ for smoking cigarettes?” I asked.

            “Well,” she hesitated. I could almost picture her biting her lip and playing with her hair. “I also drank some. They’re strict about that stuff.”

            I didn’t say anything, just listened to her ramble on and on about her school’s dean of discipline and how he’s so ready to expel kids because they hardly ever do anything wrong. I suppose being in charge of discipline in a school where there’s not much _to_ discipline gets boring. God must’ve gotten tired of watching over angels, so he created sin. And sin is beautiful in its own, mortal way, but in the end, it’s what tears us apart.

            Even if there’s no one to tell you that what you're doing is wrong, you get tired of being the bad guy. I hadn’t reached that point yet; my moral compass never pointed straight.

            No, I was still preoccupied with caring for no one but myself. I’m assuming I thought I was doing the right thing at the time. Believe it or not, there was a time when I put others before me. However, that came to an abrupt end when I was taken advantage of. It’s unacceptable to take care of everyone before you, but in the same way, it’s despicable to take care of yourself before anyone. It’s a fine line we walk, between caring too much and too less. Once, I cared too much, and I told myself I would never let that happen again.

            In the self-improvement process, I didn’t get hurt, but Emily sure did.

            She caught my attention again by pleading, “My home really isn’t good right now. Do you think I could stay with you for the night?”

            My initial instinct was to say no. I’d gotten used to telling her what she didn’t want to hear. Luckily, something in her voice made me feel sorry for her, and not out of pity, but sympathy. So I told her, “Yeah, I’ll pick you up in ten.”

            She was waiting on her porch, still in her school uniform. She’d walked slowly over to my car, ducking inside. She smelled overwhelmingly like cigarette smoke, which wasn’t unusual anymore. She told me that cigarettes calmed her down, and by the looks of her, she was getting more and more nervous. She held her backpack tightly to her chest and didn’t say a word, her swollen eyes glued to empty space.

            It was once we were inside, laying in my bed that she finally said something. Quietly, she had asked, “You didn’t mean it the other night? Did you?”

            “What? About kicking you out?”

            “No,” she’d muttered. “When you… when you told me you didn’t care what happened to me.”

            “When did I say that?” I didn't have much memory of that night; I remembered getting behind the wheel, along with the fight, but exactly what had gone down was not something I could comprehend at that moment.

            She rolled over to face me, her dark hair falling into her eyes. “We were arguing, remember? I said something about us breaking up and…” She turned back over, mumbling, “You got real angry out of nowhere.”

            “I’m sorry,” I admitted. I knew that it was because I was buzzed and irritable, so for the first time in the relationship, I actually held myself accountable.

            “Pft, yeah right,” she scoffed.

            There was a short silence, broken by her adding, “It was weird, you know? You were really out of it.” She faced me to say, “You weren’t acting like yourself.”

            “Oh? And how do I usually act?” The more she talked, the guiltier I felt. I was desperate to change the subject.

            “Well, not exactly perfect,” she admitted. She smiled, and it was something beautiful, something that I didn’t realize I’d missed seeing. “But, what I am with you for is… let’s call it your genuine intentions and ambiguous love and care.”

            I couldn’t help but ask, “You think my intentions are good?”

            “Perhaps not completely pure,” she answered slowly. “But not bad either.”

            We lay there in the dark, and she assured me, “You’re a good person. Don’t let yourself think otherwise.”

            “I could say the same for you,” I countered. She remained quiet, so I proceeded, “I know why you get so sad. It’s because you don’t like yourself. And that’s okay; it doesn’t make you any less of a person but…” She gazed at me with a look profound enough to make me almost completely lose my train of thought. “You don’t deserve that. Why are you so hard on yourself?”

            She looked up at the ceiling and replied, “Maybe there was a time where I wasn’t hard enough. A time where I lost myself.”

            “That’s okay,” I pointed out.

            “Not like I did.”

            I peered over at her to see that her eyes were shut. She was done for the night. It had been emotionally taxing on me, so I couldn’t imagine how it was for her.

            I knew in the back of my mind that I couldn’t fix that girl, that there was nothing to be done.  I made a lousy knight in shining armor, but not through fault of my own, but the fact that I couldn’t chase off or kill whatever was in her head. I served no purpose whatsoever in her life; I was merely there. She was the beauty and the beast, and in this story, she’d have to save herself.

            I couldn’t save her, but what I could do was lie next to her and wrap an arm around her, serving as a reminder that she wasn’t completely alone.

 


	10. Chapter 10

A few days after her expulsion was when Emily was kicked out of her own home.

            There was no dramatic scene, no shouting matches, and no sexy outfits like in the Pat Benetar video. For Christ’s sake, there wasn’t even a dance number. There were locked doors and unanswered phone calls. When she called me to ask to stay over, she was sure that it would all blow over, that it was merely a mistake.

            A week later and her parents still weren’t returning her calls. She started to get nervous, even if she liked to pretend she wasn’t. She started smoking more and more; the stench of her hair was unbearable. I’d gotten used to her smelling like smoke all the time, but now my own room was gaining the odor just from her being in it all the time.

            It had been over a week since Emily was expelled, seven days after her parents kicked her out, and who knows how long since she felt at home. The closest thing she had was my room, which she was stuck in as long as my mother was home. She had no idea Emily had been staying at our place, and it was surprisingly simple to keep it from her.

            Despite our success, I told Emily that hiding her was becoming ridiculous. After a lot of persuasion and reassurance, she agreed to me telling my mom she was homeless. When we came clean to my mom about the situation, I wasn't nervous whatsoever. Maybe I had confidence in my mother, that or I just knew that it was Emily's hide on the line, not mine. Whichever had motivated me, it worked, because my mom was surprisingly understanding. 

            I had been leaving the room when my mom called, “Hey. I knew the entire time.” With a wink, she’d waltzed into the living room, leaving me standing by the dining room table, dumbfounded. I had to give her credit; she wasn’t anywhere near unintelligent, and she was crafty in her own ways. I don’t know how she managed to find out about Emily living there, but she had, and she was actually able to maintain normal behavior until I came forward about the whole thing. For the first time in a while, I admired her.

            Although my mother did agree to have Emily stay with us, it was under one condition, which was to enroll her back in school. We figured that sending her to school with me was the most achievable option, even though Emily had a general defiance toward the mere thought of public school.

            I drove her on her first day. She hadn’t known what to wear; she’d gone prestigious prep schools with uniform clad students all her life. She’d never had a choice. So, I figured the right thing to do would be to give her a choice, to not direct her in any sort of way. Emily had the rare opportunity of being able to start over, something I was never given. She had gone down in ashes, and then it was time to rise out stronger.

            She ended up wearing a skirt and a button up. I was confident that her style would develop into something more appropriate for her age. At that time, she dressed like a nun. And I’m sure more kids gave her shit about it than she let on.

            I know one group of girls in particular really gave it to her. I found her after school crying in the girls’ locker room. She was almost inconsolable, and it was wearisome to pull the truth out of her. I’m still unsure about the truth of her story, and not because I think she lied to me, but because it’s easy to exaggerate.

            Heather Denman and her friends had been making fun of her.

            They walked right up to her locker, believe it or not. Emily had initiated the conversation, resulting in a snide comment from Heather. What I took from the whole thing was that Heather and her friends called her ugly and a goody two shoes.

            “I don’t want to be a goody-goody,” she’d sobbed. “I want to be normal. I want to be like you.”

            She was sitting on the closed lid of the toilet, and so I had to crouch down to her level to look her in the eye. “You’re anything but a goody-goody.” I glanced down, admitting, “And I’m not exactly the most desirable character.”

            Her crying had slowed, and she chuckled slightly, eyes still wet. Helping her to her feet, I had assured, “If you want clothes, we can get clothes. Anything for you.”

            It was through thrift stores and my mom’s closet that we pieced together Emily’s wardrobe from practically nothing. She came to school the next day wearing skinny jeans and fuck me pumps. I could tell everyone was impressed by the sudden change; I received nods and murmurings of approval from fellow boys just by walking in with her. Quite a few of them ended up asking me if she was single, and when I’d tell them she was my girlfriend, they’d laugh and call me a lucky bastard.

             And for the first time since the beginning of our relationship, I really did believe I was lucky to be with Emily. I was happy being with her, hell, I was happy looking at her. Being around her began to give me euphoria of a sort, elation almost to the point of nausea. We were around each other just as much as we had been three weeks ago, but the difference was that the silences, the stare downs, and the quiet sense of resentment were gone, gone to the point that it was almost impossible to tell they ever existed. She still reeked of cigarettes and her bones ached with an incurable sadness, and I would do anything I could to mitigate that. I was finally assuming responsibility.

            It was through a heightened ecstasy that I was blinded, totally unaware of the severity of her condition. Again, the red flags waved furiously, apparent as ever, and I was too self-absorbed, too immune to their efforts to notice. Going back, I can name almost all of the signs, the weight loss, the drug abuse, the sleeping habits, the eating patterns, everything she did and all that she was screamed the truth at me. The glaring symptoms had flown over my head, and it wasn’t until a foggy afternoon that the urgency of the situation really hit me.

            It was a foggy afternoon. I was wearing a blue sweatshirt. I had a long math assignment and Cody DeMarco broke a beaker in science. That day sticks with me to the degree that I could write a novel about the color of the sky at any given time if asked.

            That was the day when Emily tried to take her life.


	11. Chapter 11

She was in denial as much as one could be. She initially insisted that the entire incident was an accident, but everyone at the hospital, and everyone at school, and everyone in the cemetery, corpses included, knew that no one takes an entire bottle of antidepressants by mistake.

        She had gotten a hold of the prescription medication through a dealer at our school whose name she wouldn’t disclose. I have a good idea as to who it was, and my only opinion about it is that I hope that the dealer didn’t know her intentions.

        The faint idea crossed my mind that she had openly stated she was going to kill herself to her provider. Ideally, the provider was defiant, or at least reluctant, to give her any sort of drugs, but with the coaxing of dollar bills and perhaps even a dash of feminine charm, she had eased the meds out of him. How easily that apothecary must’ve been swayed, but aren’t we all? All it took was sex and cash to get them to practically send a girl to her execution. They had the final vote, and they chose wrong, likely knowing that they had. I wonder to this day if they had ever thought of her again. I’m sure they did months later when the news stories surfaced; everyone did. They thought about her for a full week, an eternity in our fleeting conscious. It was that week when Emily Kimura was on everyone’s mind and not just my own. That week, and the days succeeding her suicide attempt.

        No matter how private she wanted to keep it, the word was out by nine a.m. the next morning. She was still recovering in her hospital bed that day, and despite my pleading to stay with her, I was forced to return to school. So as everyone gossiped and laughed and grimaced, she wasn’t even there to defend herself. I did the best I could, having stepped in on a few of the nastier conversations.

        It was that one day that everyone at East Valley High had their PhD in psychology, staff and students alike. Everyone had their own hypothesis as to why Emily had tried to take her own life. The most popular opinion was that she couldn’t adapt to the new school. Others said she was getting bullied, while some doubted if there was even anything wrong. I heard a lot of horrible things that day, one being, “No death certificate, no problem.”

        I remember having rushed straight over to the hospital after school, and I don’t mean rushing as in walking at a brisk pace, no, but literally sprinting the quarter mile there. It had been just as cold as ever, so by the time I got to the hospital, my lungs were singed and my throat was coated in battery acid. But it didn’t really matter at the time; what mattered was that Emily was hurting. Just as she was falling apart, I was ready to pick up the pieces and put her back together.

        She looked as beautiful as ever, even with the slight discoloring that came with the overdose. She had deep purple moons under her eyes. I could only imagine what had kept her up the night before. As gorgeous as she was, she looked frail. Even in all her glory, she looked like one more night could take it all away from her. She was a star, and just like all the others, she was going to burn out long before her time. And when it happened, no one would really know what to think of it.

        She had smiled at me wearily, her forehead creased with sorrow. She didn’t say anything; whatever words she could manage to piece together wouldn’t serve as an explanation. Luckily for me, that wasn’t what I wanted. I didn’t want to know why, I wanted to know how to stop it. I laid with her all night and we talked for hours. We were back in our honeymoon stage, as if she’d really died and was a ghost, and this was a new relationship with a whole new being. I was the happiest I’d been in a while and I could only hope the same for her.

        She fell asleep wrapped up in my arms. I remember a distinct moment where she stirred in her sleep, kicking one of her feet slightly. It was that moment that I had a paternal instinct, a sort of overbearing protectiveness over Emily and everything she touched. I had seen her at rock bottom, and I never wanted that to happen again. I would’ve done anything to make her happy, whatever to keep her sane. When the thought of losing her crossed my mind, stoic little me burst into tears. I couldn’t fathom the idea of her not being around. It was weird to think that there was a time when I couldn’t stand her. The faint nagging thought that I had inadvertently caused this, that my past cruelty had driven her here, made me clutch onto Emily like she was all I had. And if you told me that she was all I had, I would’ve believed you.

        I have always had a range of two emotions, being a black and white person. I am blind to the color grey, and in this blindness, I have an emotion spectrum of only two sides, one side being pure hatred and loathing, and the other being intense passion and adoration. I had been at both extremes with Emily, and I had to say, loving her, while it wasn’t easier, was a whole lot more enjoyable than hating her, as well as more rewarding. It had been a long time since I viewed myself as a good person, and with that girl sleeping beside me, I was reminded that maybe I wasn’t so bad after all.

        I wanted to tell her everything. I wanted my guts on the floor and my heart in her hand. I had fucked with her cardiovascular system, so it only seemed fair that she had her turn. Of course, knowing her, I’d give her my heart with the instructions to destroy it, and she’d set it down and leave it be. She was just that kind of a person; she could always walk away. And I loved it about her, the fact that she could take my former ugliness and return it with only affection and longing. I finally understood, I finally knew that she just wanted someone, anyone to be there for her, and that she had been looking for that in me. Well, she could certainly have that, and I wanted to tell her. There was so much I could’ve said, but she wasn’t awake to hear it. I laid there for quite some time debating waking her, but whenever I came close, her tranquility, paired with her under the eye circles, would guilt me out of it. She deserved literally everything that ever was, but unfortunately, all I could give her was one night’s sleep.

        I didn’t accomplish any sleeping myself that night, who could’ve? I kept one eye on Emily and the other on the clock, dreading the hour that I had to leave her. That time came, and out I went, making sure to give her a kiss on the forehead before trudging outside, back into reality. I was familiarized with reality to the point that I didn't want her exposed to it. It was, and still is, a harsh world, and she was too good for it. She deserved everything and nothing at the same time. She should have had mountains moved for her, oceans named after her, and galaxies put in her hands. But all she got was cigarettes, suicide attempts, and me. The empathy I had for her was crippling. 


	12. Chapter 12

 

            Emily was back on her saddle within days of having almost died of an overdose. Sufficient damage was done to her liver, but it could be spared. However, they warned her that if something of the same nature were to happen again, she would most likely need a transplant.

            There was always a lot of ‘ifs’ when it came to Emily, and things will probably stay this way. One of those ifs popped into my head not long after her suicide attempt, and that if was whether or not she was planning on doing it again. Her liver had taken so heavy of a toll that if she were to overdose again, but fail to tell anyone, it could very easily kill her. If I was capable of figuring that out, then I’m sure that thought was in her mind as well.

            The hospital, of course, wouldn’t just send her back out on the streets without any attempt at rehabilitation. Not only was she subjected to group adolescent therapy, but also to a support group of teens trying to quit smoking. She had kept the nasty little habit to herself; however, it was obvious to just about anyone that she was the heaviest smoker around. I did notice an increase in the anti-smoking ads at school ever since Emily started to attend, and I wondered if she had been any contribution to the cause, whether that be intentional or not.

            Emily’s overdose was so widely discussed at school that it may as well have been in the announcements. I could picture it: "Boys’ varsity basketball players, please turn in your uniforms. Auditions for the school play will be Thursday afternoon in the auditorium after 8th period. Emily Kimura tried to kill herself. Tell all your friends."

            Despite the popularity of her misfortune, the conversation only lasted for a couple of days. It was a strong forty-eight hours, and by strong, I mean that one kid from her English class texted her and they weren’t shy to talk about it. But by hour forty-nine, they didn't want to hear about it. The mention of suicide itself was enough to make them stir in their seats like usual.

            Even though she was in the hospital for most of this, Emily noticed as well.  I can recall to this day her exact words, and they were, “I wish I had cancer.”

            I had given her a sideways glance. “Keep smoking like that and you won’t have to wish for it.”

            Smirking, she’d elaborated, “I wish that all of this funky mental business, unbalanced chemicals and whatnot, would be treated like cancer. Depression and cancer, they are both medical conditions, technically speaking.”

            That was when she really caught my attention. I played it off like I was amusing her childish wonders, but in reality, I was dying for a deeper explanation. I had reached the point that anything out of Emily’s mouth was the best thing I’d ever heard, with only the last thing she’d said as a relative competition. Even in my blind obsession for that girl’s way with words, I was able to tell that this thought stood out. For me, it was the star on top of the trees, while others may have labeled it as a diamond in the rough. “And how is cancer treated?”

            She had shrugged, biting her lip, almost as if to trying string her thoughts into the sentence that would give them the proper honor. “You know, everyone brings you cards and stuffed animals, and you get ice cream for breakfast because they know you won’t last long.” She paused to pull her knees to her chest, proceeding, “Your whole family stays and everyone tells you how strong you are and what an inspiration you are just for existing.”

            “And what happens with depression?” I asked.

            She had responded immediately. “You’re the talk of the town for one day, and then nothing is said. There are awkward silences, and there’s late nights, and not much else.”

            And no matter what I did, I couldn’t get much out of her the rest of the night, spare head nods and one word answers.

            I was understandably concerned about Emily. I was doing all that I could to be supportive, but at the same time, I was utterly terrified of the thought that maybe I had applied damage that could not be undone. Eventually it struck me that perhaps the best thing that I could do was to go to group therapy with her. Part of me doubted what the use was of being around people in it just as deep as she was. It was like when I was failing math, and so according to the school the best course of action to take was to put me in a study hall filled with other kids failing math. As you could’ve predicted, when kids who suck at math help kids who suck at math, not much progress is made. I figured group therapy would be the same way, dreamers clinging to each other with the hopes of coming to grips with reality, only to fall deeper into their own worlds. Emily was a dreamer from the start, but I felt that she was losing it. She was starting to see the world for what it really was, and it scared her to death.

            I thought it was in her best interest for me to attend group therapy with her.

            It was a strange experience, to say the least. Her fellow members were easily the most interesting people I had ever met. Despite this, I wanted to know nothing about them. I knew their names, and that was enough for me. Their personalities taunted me, tempted me to learn more about them, but to look past the surface would be to throw myself into deep waters. They were in group therapy for a reason, and it was a reason that I wasn’t entirely willing to find out.

            Emily sat quiet throughout the whole session; in fact, I must’ve spoken more than she did merely by briefly introducing myself. Could her limited participation have been the reason why she wasn’t getting better? I didn't rightfully know, and before that question could ever begin to be answered, I would have to determine whether or not she was improving. With Emily, it was always hard to tell.

            I drove her to my house, and for the first time in what felt like forever, she mentioned her parents. She had mumbled, “It’s my mom’s birthday.”

            “She aint getting a card,” I replied, pulling into my driveway. I smiled at her, my grin being returned with glazed, vacant eyes and taut lips. Her lips were looking real chapped lately, even though it was only getting warmer. I could only suspect that it had been anxiety causing her to bite them to flakes.

            I was losing her. I never knew I had her until she was slipping away. It put me in an odd position; on one hand, she needed support, and on the other, she needed her space. She wasn’t being at all vocal with me, either, so it was impossible to distinguish when she needed me and when she didn’t. She loved me, but not in the same way that she originally had. It wasn’t necessarily worse, perhaps it was even better due to my sudden cooperation, but it was out of place and misled. She had given me nothing but affection while I had treated her like dirt. Had she gotten out at the start, she would’ve had a bad night or two, not this. A big part of me wishes I never met her, and not for my benefit, but hers.


	13. Chapter 13

            Emily steadily declined in every way one can. Her grades barely stuck around passing, drama being the only one she was excelling at with a B minus, a grade that was still unusual in comparison to her past marks. She smoked as heavily as ever, despite her weekly meetings with the support group trying to get her to quit. She never slept enough, and she was awake at odd times and asleep at even stranger hours. She got really quiet; she withdrew from everyone, and had I possessed the guts, I would’ve called out her unhealthy eating habits.

            It was a Thursday night that I had been cleaning our room, which had turned into a pit ever since her suicide attempt. It had taken a visible toll on not only her, but everything she touched, it seemed. She was almost like a tornado; an internal conflict raged inside her, pushing her to wreck havoc everywhere she went. Having pulled pile after pile of discarded clothing and papers from the floor, I eventually stumbled upon a notebook that I could not identify as my own.

            It was completely ordinary, no distinct markings of any sort on the cover, and not even a design or pattern. It was a solid, black, college ruled notebook, which I, in all honesty, expected to be blank when I opened it. Boy, was I mistaken. It was almost as if the universe had compelled Emily to write a manifesto in a seemingly blank notebook with the sole intention of proving me wrong.

            Her writings covered each page, ‘covered’ meaning literally the entire page, yes even the margins and the inside of the front cover. It was in that neat, precise handwriting that I grew to know so well, only as you went further back; it grew more and more frantic, wilder by the sentence. I had read only excerpts out of respect, but my, were they unsettling. She may have been my star, and while she had a galaxy in her heart, she had storms in her head. What I could make out of her journal painted pictures of despair that I couldn’t fathom, a sort of sharp sadness that could only be expressed in jagged letters and jumbled sentences. Not to mention, a novel’s worth of parentheses and ellipses. She really poured her heart out into what was written in that notebook, and the pages all but dripped with her blood.

            In fact, bodily fluids would be the only thing that could possibly make the diary any more personal. It was composed in such a way that the only more raw it could get would be through the literal use of tears and sweat.

            I was thankful that she had been downstairs with my mother when I discovered her journal, grateful that I had not enlisted in her help in the wearisome task of tidying the disheveled bedroom. In seeing those scribbled writings and only being exposed to parts of them, I’d come into a brief, but nonetheless sure contact with her soul. I wasn’t entirely sure if that was something she wanted me to see.

            Emily, per usual, had fallen asleep by five in the afternoon. I took this opportunity by the horns, rushing to find my mother soon after I saw Emily’s sleeping figure.

            I ran into my mom, literally, at the foot of the stairs. The laundry basket that had been residing against her hip titled, almost spilling some of its contents before she corrected this. She raised an eyebrow at me expectantly.

            “Sorry,” I apologized quickly. “Look, this is really important. Can we please get rid of all the knives in the house?”

            I had grown to have a profound respect for my mother ever since she had caught on to me smuggling Emily into our home. Seeing her in a new light every moment, I had recognized that yeah, she did not like to be told what to do.“Excuse me?”

            I had pushed forward, so panicked that my hands shook as I continued, “Not just knives, but scissors, razors, anything?”

            She had sighed exasperatedly, asking, “And why is this important right at this moment?”

            I wanted to keep Emily’s journal private, so I didn’t confess to finding it. But I knew that I could get my mother on board with a single three word sentence. “It’s for Emily.”

            An hour later, the house was completely rid of any sort of sharp object or even dangerous material. From plastic sacks to scissors, all were moved to the garage, where they were locked. Certain items we couldn’t dispose of completely, such as medicine, for example. Instead, they were locked away inside the house, only my mother knowing the combination to the safe they were stored in.

            When Emily woke up, she was confused as to why she had to have permission to access the Tylenol. My mom had hugged her, promising, “It’s for your own good, sweetie. We love you, and we’d do anything to keep you safe.”

            Emily stood there, stunned by the measures we’d come to in her name. She was dumbfounded; completely unable to convince herself that anyone could care about her so much. But two people right in that house did, and I probably can’t speak for the both of us when I say this, but at any given time, I would’ve died for Emily. She was the world to me, and according to my mother, I looked at her like she put the stars in the sky and pushed up the sun every morning. Could you blame me? She was, after all, the only person who had a choice to leave so many times but chose to stay. The opportunities she had to leave me had surfaced thick and fast, but she pushed each one away. For what reason, I will never know, but I am so utterly grateful. 

            Everything seemed to be settling down; my relationship with Emily was stronger than it ever had been. Despite this, I couldn't get rid of the nagging feeling that however long ago, I was the one who broke Emily. If I was responsible, I assumed that what made her snap would have been that weird period of time where I hated her for no justifiable reason. Looking back, I still can’t find a solid explanation for the way I treated her. Was I letting out some bottled rage? Maybe. Playing the offense in my first relationship but going overboard? Perhaps. All I know is that to this day, people imply that I pushed her to do what she did about a month later. And while I believe that there was something dark inside that girl before she ever met me, something just beneath the surface, I also realize that I may have brought it out in her. There was no way that I single-handedly created the problem, but I certainly might have exacerbated an existing dilemma.


	14. Chapter 14

As the weeks dragged on, Emily only got worse and worse. She looked about as disheveled as one can, with bleary, tired eyes, greasy hair, sloppy clothing and smeared eyeliner. The boys stopped talking to me about her, which doesn’t mean they stopped talking altogether. As Emily’s condition deteriorated, the gossip returned. The snide remarks, the hushed whispering, the collective mumbling buzz that ceased whenever she entered a room. She’d have to be either really optimistic, blindingly so, or incredibly oblivious to not notice what was going on. Everyone knew that something was wrong, and it was quite clear that they were all willing to kick back and enjoy the show.

            It was on a Saturday night that Emily had given me access to her grades. We were laying in my room, the window cracked slightly, permitting the hush of early spring into the bedroom.

            She was so cold she was shivering. I was warm, almost to the point of perspiration. I’d given her my duvet, draped it over her hunched and trembling shoulders. She hardly settled so I stood, searching for more blankets.

            My head was poked under the bed when she told me, “I’m failing AP Chemistry.”

            I was quiet, unsure of what to say. Of course, to her this was an invitation to keep going. “I mean, don’t ask me how. I guess I’m not as smart as everyone says I am.”

            “Don’t talk like that.” I peeked up at her, just to see that her back was still turned, just as it had been ten minutes ago.

            “You want to see a train wreck?” She’d laughed, but it lacked depth, and as a result, sounded hollow and forced. “Log onto 642 on the school’s website. Check out my progress reports; that’ll make any student feel better about their academic performance.” She was silent for a while, then adding, “The password is Kim46.”

            There was nothing I could say, nothing to be done to try and prove her wrong. It was one of those times where I didn’t want to be right for the novelty of it, but for her own good. I wanted to tell her how intelligent and how thoughtful of a person she was. I have always prided myself solely on my intelligence, so it was with great reluctance that I admitted to myself that on every level, Emily Kimura was smarter than me.

            But there was nothing in the world I could have said or done to fix her. She wasn’t past the point of no return just yet, but she was far beyond the repair of others. To get better, she’d have to do it herself, and I just don’t think it was something she had in her in those last few months.

            I looked up her grades that next night while she was asleep, half expecting the login information to be incorrect. But of course, the universe just loves to prove me wrong. The password and username she’d told me worked, and with a hesitant click of the mouse, I brought up her current grades.

            Sure enough, she was failing AP Chemistry. The rest of her report card sat at a steady C minus average, with the exception of drama, which she had a solid 95 percent in.

            It was strange; the entire report card was not above a C except for that one grade, which on its own was really quite outstanding.

            It was during the end of sixth period that next day that I found an oasis. And no, not an actual puddle of water in the midst of a literal desert, but a glimmer of hope in not only my, but also Emily’s life. It was East Valley High spring production of Hamlet, our own personal oasis.

            It was at the very end of that class that the announcement came over the loudspeaker. “Auditions for Hamlet will be held next Thursday after school in the auditorium. Signup sheets are in my office, and please tell Ms. Darren if you cannot make it but would like to be involved.”

            I put Emily’s name down without a drop of uncertainty in my blood. For the first time in a while, I knew I was doing the right thing. As I penciled in the letters of her highness, I was full of hope, hope that this would be her way out.

            Emily was absent at school that day; she’d been gone a lot in those past few weeks. She was prone to stress induced headaches and stomach cramps, as well as a serious issue with motivation. All of these were signs of her persistent depression, which grew seemingly more and more severe by the day.

            She knew nothing of the play, but boy, was I ready to talk her ear off. In fact, it was within moments of arriving at the house that I told her all about how I signed her up.

            “You what?!” she’d squeaked.

            I cocked my head, reiterating, “I signed you up for auditions. They’re next Thursday so…” I had hit her lightly with one of my notebooks, advising, “Get practicing.”

            “Why would you do that?” she barked. “God, you didn’t even ask!”

            “I- well geez, I don’t know. I figured you’d want to, considering your grade in drama,” I replied.

            “You ‘figured’?” she demanded. “Do me a favor and butt out!”

            She stormed off, and I raced after her, grabbing her forearm. “Hear me out. You could really have a lot of fun with this. The point of life is to find something you’re passionate about and chase it, and never give up on pursuing it. This could be it for you; I have a gut feeling. Please, just think about it. If you can’t do it for me, do it for yourself.” I loosened my grip, adding, “You deserve to be happy.”

            She tore her arm from my grasp, darting to my room and closing the door. I left it at that; I’d said all I wanted to say and did the best I could to try and help her. All that was left to do was wait, wait and see if auditions were a chance she was willing to take.


	15. Chapter 15

            We didn’t speak about the play for days. She had gone back as though nothing had happened between us, as though she hadn’t lashed out at me at the mentioning of auditions. She played the neutral part so well that I nearly forgot about the play completely. It wasn’t until a potential catastrophe that the thought of the school play even crossed my mind.

            It was a Tuesday after school that Emily didn’t return home. It was some two weeks after the play auditions, which I was nearly positive she hadn’t gone to. She had been walking home randomly some days, starting a couple of Thursdays ago. I tried to keep the fact that she enjoyed walking home in mind as I fell into a state of total panic.

            An hour and a half later, Emily still wasn’t home, and I was worried almost to the point of delusion. I debated over whether or not to contact the authorities. I realize that most would see calling the police as an overreaction given the situation (especially because we lived in Chicago, where 911 calls were as regular as the sun rising), but I had this thing where if anything was atypical, I would assume the worst. Catastrophizing everything brought on an unwavering and unsettling paranoia in addition to a general sense of doom, and that was what made me tell my mom I loved her so often and double check that my window was locked every night.

            My finger was hovering over the call button on my cellphone as Emily walked through the door. Glancing at the clock, I realized that she had been missing for nearly two hours. “Where were you; you gave me eight heart attacks!”

            She smiled slightly, biting her bottom lip. She toed the carpet, hanging her head a bit as she mumbled, “I- I’m sorry… about how harsh I was the other day, I mean. About the whole play audition thing, I shouldn’t have lashed out like that.”

            I stood there unsure of what to do. I hadn’t been expecting that as a response, and my question still wasn’t answered. “Hey, that’s alright. But seriously, where were you?”

            She grinned even more, daring to show her teeth. “Guess.”

            “I- I uh… geez,” I muttered. I scratched my head, guessing, “A sports game? Detention? How should I know?”

            “It’s something you were very excited about,” she hinted.

            I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe her, not in that moment. Trust was all I’d given her over the past few months, and despite the tremendous amount of understanding we’d had in each other at that point, I could not fathom what she was getting at. “You’re doing the play.”

            She nodded, smiling her widest yet. She hugged me, standing on her tip toes to kiss me on the cheek. We hadn’t kissed in quite a while, in fact. We had become more platonic the more we were together. I can’t even say for sure if we were still dating when I lost her. I suppose that during my speech a short couple of months later, I’d been announced as her boyfriend.

            I held her close, resting my chin atop her head. She nuzzled into my chest, and I muttered into her hair, “I am so proud of you.”

            “Me too,” she agreed. She gave me one more squeeze before parting up the steps, calling, “I’m doing homework, don’t bug me!”

            I smiled, because that was the first time in what felt like ages that she’d even attempted to do a school assignment. She was getting better, bit by bit.

            This forward progression on her part continued as the play practice went on, and I did all that I could to nurture that growth. We started hanging out like we had when we first met; only this time, it was almost more pleasant to speak with her. When I’d first met her, although talking to her sent electric currents through my veins, I had done hardly anything to earn anything she said. Knowing that she was finally moving ahead, and that I was a small part of that, well, it helped me sleep for a while.

            Things were going better than they had in months. Her grades steeped upwards, not as rapidly as they’d fallen of course, but they gradually hiked uphill. She was working to get that 3.8 GPA back, and I just stood out of her way. She was a girl on a mission, and if my mother taught me anything, it was that when a girl really wants something, she’ll get it, and while it may take a while, you don’t want to be her setback.

            I think that for a time there, I was Emily’s obstacle, a constant weight pulling her down. It felt so good to finally be a positive part in her life. It wasn’t just because she was a girl, it wasn’t even because she was Emily, but it was so unfamiliarly gratifying to not be someone’s downfall, to not be a bad memory.

            I started hanging around the auditorium whenever Emily had play practice. I could tell from her very first line that she was something special. She captivated me, toyed with my emotions as though they were merely putty in her hands, and then left me out to dry when she was interrupted by the director.

            The director was our math teacher, an older woman that Emily obviously liked. Their chemistry was highly apparent, and I had a strong sense that the teacher knew what Emily had been going through. The important thing wasn’t that the teacher knew, but that she listened, that she understood. Mrs. Payne was one of the few people in the world who cared what Emily had to say. I wish Emily had had more people like that in her life; she truly deserved it.

            The director had called me up to her desk at the end of one of the final play practices. It was dress rehearsal, in fact. The actors, including Emily, were distributed across the school bathrooms, scrubbing off stage makeup with hand soap and sandpaper hand towels.

            Mrs. Payne addressed me by name. This was odd, because I hadn’t had a single class with her, not even a study hall. I’d been wary, asking, “Yes? You know my name?”

            She’d laughed at my expression, explaining, “Emily talks about you all the time. It’s not hard to put things together.”

            “Fair enough,” I agreed. “What is it?”

            She’d smiled, urging me to come closer. She had lowered her voice, telling, “Emily is one of the most gifted students I’ve ever had.”

            I wasn’t too surprised; Emily’s performance was absolutely outstanding. I decided to thank Mrs. Payne, on Emily’s behalf. “That’s really nice of you to say.”

            Mrs. Payne had nodded, adding, “I just think… she seems so down sometimes. Just do me a favor, would you? Let her know every day how special she is. We all are, but not all of us know it.”

            “Of course,” I had replied, omitting the fact that this favor was already on my to-do list.

            It was that moment that Emily had skipped in, swinging her arms around me. “Ready to go?”

            “Yeah,” I answered. I grinned at Mrs. Payne before following Emily out to the car, our fingers intertwined.

            In the car, I decided to strike up conversation with Emily. “So, opening night is Friday.”

            “Yeah,” she responded. “It’s all gone so fast.”

            I nodded, then asking, “Are you excited?”

            She shrugged, her smile still wide. “Yeah. Kind of nervous, sort of happy.”           

            The fact that she was nervous made me scoff, scoff so hard that it sounded like a cough. “Nervous? _You?_ You’re amazing on stage; what do you have to be nervous about?”

            “Well,” she hesitated. “I just… I care so much, you know? This is all I have going for me. I can’t imagine what would happen to me if something went wrong.”

            I leaned in toward her, my eyes still on the road. “Hey, you listen to me. Everything will be fine, okay? You’re good at what you do and that’s enough.”

            She hadn’t replied, only gazed out her window for the rest of the ride home.


	16. Chapter 16

Friday night couldn’t have come any quicker. It seemed like one minute I was signing Emily up as an actress behind her back, and the next I was backstage with her, holding her bangs back as she applied foundation.

            I helped her with her makeup and getting dressed, which consisted mostly of holding hangers in one hand, a straightener in the other, and bobby pins in my mouth (which may or may not have been used). I didn't ask; only did what she told me to. Knowing how important that night was to her, I was doing all that I could to be supportive, and if that meant sticking used hair accessories in my mouth for a few minutes, so be it. 

            It wasn’t until the ten minutes before they had to take their places onstage that she started to get nervous. I suppose she’d been anxious all week, but it wasn’t really a huge problem until when it was five minutes till show time and she ran from the dressing room to go vomit.

            When she returned, I cupped her jaw, assuring, “You’ll do great, okay? You’ve got this.”

            She smiled, and I gave her a quick peck on the cheek. “Good luck, knock them dead.”

            “I will,” she replied.

            She then headed off to stand behind the curtains, her chin held high and her walk crisp and precise. She stood among her fellow actors, and she gave me a wave before facing the direction of the audience.

            I headed to the back wings where I could watch the entire play. From there I watched Emily, and that girl surpassed my high expectations. I was impressed by the show she put on; it was indisputably the best performance she’d ever given.

            Things were going great- no, better than great- they were going excellent. I’d known that things would’ve gone well, and I certainly knew that the production wouldn’t crash and burn. Still, I couldn’t have asked for a better turnout. The execution was flawless, not only from Emily, but from every single person involved, from protagonists to non-speaking parts to lighting.

            That was, until the fourth scene of the final act. I had relaxed considerably, and so had Emily, clearly, for her mannerisms clearly showed that she had grown used to the stage. I’d started out not necessarily anxious, but perhaps a bit apprehensive. I’d known Emily had her lines down pat (in the past couple of months, Emily practicing her role became about as frequent as the sunrise and set), and I knew that she was talented. But with all that knowledge, I also had a drop of wisdom, wisdom that reminded me that nerves could ruin everything. It was a rare occurrence for me to have seen Emily under pressure, and while it didn’t happen often, when it did, she didn’t give the best reaction.

            But there she was, acting as if her life had depended on it. She painted a realistic picture, one that haunts my memory to this day. For the first time, everything was perfect.

            And then she stammered. Her voice wavered, skipping over the same word, before cutting off completely. Amidst all of the success, and well aware of the hard work everyone had put into the play, she forgot her line.

            Her face turned white as a sheet, and her eyes flickered with an intense fear. It was a knife in my gut, to see her peak, only to fall back in the ditches. She had reached the pinnacle of her short life, and it fell as rapidly as it had risen, only with the plummet, it hit about six times as hard. 

            No matter how well she had done, no matter how well the play had been proceeding, she’d blown it all and in that moment, the previous accomplishments were minuscule in comparison to the failure that overcame her.

            I tried to catch Emily’s eyes, tried to meet her gaze, just to see that she was staring not at me, but something else. My eyes followed her line of view, and that was when I realized the dilemma.

            Her parents had attended.

            All of the nerve in the world, all of the utter disregard for other peoples’ pursuits and dreams, and all of the bitterness, must have been held in her parents’ hearts that night. I can promise that, in return, mine held nothing but contempt.

            Hatred overcame me like nothing I had ever felt before, and I wanted nothing more than to rip them limb from limb. It was this primal aggression, a sort of rage that was unattainable by any other means. Had my concern for Emily not held me back, I may have attacked them at that given moment.

            Emily had wrapped up her lines in a stammered, clotted string of words, riddled with unnatural pauses. They weren’t even her actual lines; they were obviously ad libbed, and not well, either.  It was after the curtains had closed and the lights dimmed that she burst into tears.

            I rushed over to her as quickly as I could manage, stumbling through the throngs of props, actors, and backdrops. She failed to see me, wiping her eyes as she stormed through the crowd, being brushed by hands the entire way.

            I ran after her, getting caught up in the wave of people. I struggled to push through, losing her by the time I had reached the theatre lobby. I instead sprinted to my car, leaving my coat behind at the theatre as I sped off in pursuit of Emily.

            I drove around the city for what seemed like centuries. As the time went on, I grew more and more worried for Emily. I didn’t know where she was, who she was with, or what she was doing, and it scared the shit out of me.

            It was cold as well, and about fifteen minutes into searching, snow began to fall hard, and that only made me drive faster, and call her name out the window even louder.

I’m lucky I hadn’t received a ticket for my driving that night. In my distressed state, even my turn signals were frantic. It wasn’t until about an hour later that I resignedly returned home, determined to tell my mother and do all we could to find our Emily.

            I ran inside; the frigid air nipping at my face. I swung open the door and stepped onto the threshold, and stopped.

            And there I stood, a heavy snow pelting my back, ice crystals melting to the skin of my neck, and my fingers clutching the freezing doorknob. I stood and I stared into my own living room as if I had never seen it before. For a split second, I didn’t know where I was, how I’d gotten there, or even who I was. I just saw Emily, sobbing, wailing on the floor, throwing a full blown tantrum.

            But this tantrum was not of petty desires. It was of wounded cries and betrayed caterwauls. She had screamed as though someone were twisting her stomach, cried as though she had lost everyone dear to her. And in a way, she had. She hadn’t lost anyone physically; no one _had_ died, but she had endured something worse than personal loss.

            She had lost herself. All that she’d worked for and all that she was were systematically destroyed that night, leaving behind nothing but raw emotion with no context. And it was coming out not in rays or spurts, but in floods.

            My mom sat on the couch, tears stained down her own cheeks. She had mouthed to me, “Close the door.”

            And I did, as quietly as I could manage. And I stepped right over to Emily and I held her, held her like no one ever had, and I squeezed her like no one ever would. Then I looked into her eyes, and I gave her the steadiest, most reassuring eyes I had.

            Then I left her. I left her without a word, left her on the ground. In my eyes, I had done all that I could. There wasn’t much I could’ve said, and anything I had said might have only worsened things.

            But I still blame myself for going to bed after that. Granted, I didn’t sleep well, or much, but I felt I could’ve done more. Not necessarily said something, but certainly been there more than I had.

            But I made that choice to go to sleep, and I consciously decided to leave her down there.

            I wish I would’ve said something. That was my last moment with her, and it was one of utter silence.


	17. Chapter 17

            When I rose that morning, Emily was fast asleep on the couch, her hair matted and theatre makeup run down her face in smeary streaks. Her eyeliner managed to reach her jawline.

            I combed a hand through her hair absently, only for a few seconds. I left the arm of the couch, retreating to the bathroom to take a shower.

            My mother told me Emily wouldn’t be going to school; that she’d been through enough. When I asked her what she’d say to the school to make the absence excused, my mom replied that she’d say Emily was ill. That wasn’t far from the truth; Emily was deathly pale, even with the caked layers of orange Ben Nye foundation splotched across her cheeks. She had a fever as well; when I had touched her hair, heat radiated off of her and into my hand, warming the skin of my palm.

            So I left, just as usual. I was hesitant to leave Emily, but my mom assured me that all she needed was some rest; that she would feel much better after some sleep. She had also told me, “Besides, you’ll see her later this afternoon.”

            Neither of us saw it coming.  

            What happened after I left that house can only be assumed by me. Mom swears on her account on what must’ve happened, but I can’t be entirely sure.  

            According to Mom, she’d gone about her daily chores, folding laundry in the den with Emily sleeping at her side. She remarked how peaceful Emily had looked, despite her disheveled state.

            It was around 10:20 a.m. that my mom went to take a shower.

            My mother is careful about everything she does. She wrote out a note for Emily in the event that Emily was to wake up while she was still bathing. The note was signed, “We love you, Emily.” She’d set a can of soup beside the couch where Emily lay, in addition to a bottle of orange juice.      

            We can only guess when Emily woke up. Mom says that she got out of the shower around 10:40, went upstairs a bit prior to 10:45, and had returned downstairs by 11:00 a.m. That leaves a forty minute window for what Emily had done.

            Mom returned downstairs, immediately noticing that Emily was absent from her sleeping spot on the couch. The covers were carefully made, and the can of soup and serving of juice lay untouched on the floor. 

            She checked the bathroom first. Seeing that it was empty, she went to my room next, to find that vacant as well.

            She began to panic, and she spent a decent amount of time pacing around the house; she guesses anywhere from five to twenty minutes. Finally, she stumbled upon the note that Emily had left.

            It only said “I love you. It’s not your fault, and I’m safe.” It was signed ‘Emily’ with ink smeared from where tears she wiped from her eyes ran down her fingers.

            The note was crumpled around the sides, particularly at the bottom where she had signed it, as though someone had gripped it tightly, even slightly tearing the sheet in the process.

            That’s when my mother contacted the police.

            The police told her they’d have to wait to put Emily on the missing persons list; Chicago was a city where parents regularly filed lost child reports, only to find the kid somewhere in the vast streets just hours later.

            But Emily wasn’t some kid who forgot to tell her parents they were having a sleepover. Emily was almost an adult, one that made the conscious decision to pack up her things and leave. She’d left hardly anything behind, but it wasn’t like she had a lot at our house to begin with.

            We didn’t know what made her leave, or how long she’d been considering it. What we wanted to know was who pushed her away- her parents or us. We liked to think that we were a positive in her life at that time, but we really had no clue as to how she viewed us. She was polite enough, but that was just Emily. She could resent you and you’d never know it.

            I liked to think that the play was a last straw. It made it easier to believe that leaving was what she truly wanted, and it was nice to think of her being in control. But at the same time, that meant that she had been more upset than she let on, and that in those short months I knew her, she was suffering.

            We were anticipating her return in those first few days that she was gone. We kept everything just as she’d left it, not moving a single thing that she’d failed to take with her. Mom kept Emily in her prayers, and she told me to do the same. I started praying again just to plead to bring her back to us. I hadn’t prayed in what felt like a long time, and it was just like me to do nothing about that until I needed something.

            What I needed was Emily back. School was rough; everything seemed to be a reminder of her. Hearing her name called to no answer in class was the worst. Half of the time, I expected her to answer as usual. I even caught myself stealing hopeful, but foolish glances at her empty chair.

            I began to find ugliness in everything that surrounded me. Everyone I had once tolerated rubbed me the wrong way, and all that I had found beautiful turned sour.

            I’m sure that some of you reading are relieved that she had been a runaway instead of dying. While an untimely and poorly placed death would put me, the white male protagonist, through a great deal of agony, it’s not what happened.

            But to tell you the truth, I would almost prefer that she was dead. I mean, at least that way I could get some closure. I could lay awake in bed knowing her corpse was rotting underground, sick at the fact that I would never see her alive again. I’d lose sleep over whether or not there was an afterlife, and if there was one, if I was able to make it there and see her. I’d know that she’d go to heaven; she was almost too good for the world. As for myself, I’d wonder what changes I’d need to make to reach her.

But no, she just had to go and make herself a modern mystery. I still lay awake, but not to the thought of her rotting corpse. I lay there and toss and turn about what – and _who –_ she might be doing. Hell, even my best guesses are vague ideas. And that's the positive side, at worst, they're nothing but the frantic thoughts of a scared boy who's lost someone dear to him.

That may sound dramatic, but in her disappearance, I truly did lose her. I grieved just as hard as anyone, and the void she carved inside me felt like a burning hole, one that could never be filled.

I didn't battle with the thought of God taking her and the unfairness of it all; I dealt with the possibility that she truly hated me. I'd almost have God resent me in her place; I never opened up to God like how I fell apart for that girl.

I missed her to pieces. I never knew what it felt like to physically ache from despair. I soon familiarized myself with that gnawing, sore feeling in my chest. There were times where I felt like I could just die from the loneliness, and all I wanted was for my passing to speed up.


	18. Chapter 18

There was always that big debate over what’s supposed to be the best years of your life. The standard outlook is high school; that way parents can encourage their children’s happiness while holding their own regrets and excessive nostalgia close to heart. For those that cynicism hit extra hard, they’d argue that the best years of your life take place in early childhood, before you can comprehend what life insurance is and your biggest problem is how to write your name.

            So I was always torn between what my peaking point of my life was- childhood or high school. High school was mundane to the point of being infuriating, so I had to side with those that believed childhood was the best time in your lifespan.

            And of high school, senior year was supposed to be a time of self-discovery and independence, particularly during graduation. But I spent those last months of school moping, waiting for any sign of Emily. Graduation was a blur, nothing but a bunch of personalized caps and expensive shoes. Emily would’ve graduated alongside of us. I can’t even remember if they mentioned her at all during the ceremony.

            Mom started going to church again. She told me that losing Emily like she had was like having a child die; that a part of her had gone too. She knew that she couldn’t get that piece back, but she explained that through God, the hole felt a little less gaping. Emily’s name stung a bit less and Mom’s thoughts ran a tad slower. She felt in control in the house of God, she told me. She liked the feeling of comfort and love she had in the Lord, something that she could always come back to.

            I went to church with her one morning; I was looking for some of this hope she always went on about. I woke up before noon and put on a tie all for the sake of getting a taste. I wanted that assurance that Mom had; I wanted to feel like things were going to work out.  

She attended this Lutheran church out towards the east part of town. Although my mom wasn’t confirmed in any branch of Christianity, she found this particular church most suitable. I remember her bouncing from Methodist to Presbyterian to Catholic; she didn’t like to attach labels to her beliefs.

            Of all the churches in the city, Emily’s parents went to that particular one.

            They were about six pews ahead of us and off to the right. They never saw us come in, so I had the pleasure at gazing absently at the back of their heads. I wondered if they always went to church here, or if Emily being gone made them start up again as it had with my mother.

            There was this part in the sermon where everyone was supposed to duck their head and say their own little prayer in their head. Mom encouraged me to do this. Her lips moved when she prayed, even though the pastor made it clear that it was supposed to be a thinking activity.

            I just about stared at Mr. and Mrs. Kimura. I couldn’t help but think of what they might be praying about. They wanted their daughter home, that I was sure. Maybe God would have answered if they’d asked sooner, for instance, when she started to live under our roof.

            And for a few moments, I absolutely hated them. I glared fiery holes into their backs with the meanest eyes I had; I wanted them to burst into flames right there during communion. I pictured their bodies aflame, limbs flailing and skin bubbling and curling against the heat. Their flames would spread to the pews and then to the steeple itself, so everyone could go home and repent in the comfort of their leather recliners.

            But I stopped.

            I don’t know why, but I started to think of all that I had done. The relationship I’d shared with Emily broke through my head in waves. Sea foam settled behind my eyes.

            It was my fault. If I had never met her, none of this would’ve happened. If I had left her alone, if I could have just kept it in my pants like I had every other time. Emily would still be here, and her parents wouldn’t be sitting there praying for the return of their oldest child.

            I owed them a daughter, and I had no way of getting her back.

            I broke down right there in the chapel, surrounded by the scent of drugstore perfume and communal red wine. Mom was slow to notice; I was already standing and on my way out by the time she caught on.

            She’d followed me out of there, driving me home wordlessly. She knew how I was, knew that talking to me was futile when I was like that.

            I was overwhelmed with the flooding sense of fault, terrible fault. My insides churned and twisted with the regret of it all. And the shame, the shame came and went, going on and off like a switch. I could swim in all that was overcoming me.

            I threw myself on my bed, and without even thinking about it, I’d punched the wall.

            Hitting the wall released some of the emotions that had been pent up in me, and that was good. What was bad was the crippling pain that surged through my hand, starting at the knuckles and swelling to the wrist.

            I clutched my injured hand, writhing in pain. I’d fallen off my bed I was so blind with hurt, and for the first time in months, it was physical pain that had me reeling, not emotional.

            I groaned, focusing my eyes ahead of me. I frowned, gazing emptily at the space beneath my bed.

            And then I saw it.

            Emily’s journal.

            I sprang to my knees, reaching beneath the bed with my good hand and fishing the thing out. I flipped it open, going madly through its pages.

            I don’t know why I was so desperate to revisit her journal. A part of me was simply astonished; I was positive she’d taken it with her. The rest of me was hoping for some sort of relief, maybe a mention of me in that diary, anything to prove that she didn’t hate me as much as I hated myself then.

            I found more than what I was looking for.

            It was on the second to last page, written in black ink.

            “Dear my first boyfriend, my best friend, my favorite person and my biggest what if,

            I hope you’ve found this by June. If not, then you really should clean your room more often.

            This is really hard to write, what with you sleeping next to me and all. Just the sound of your breathing, secure and steady, is almost enough to put me over the edge.

            So I’m going to make this quick. In less than a month from now, I will leave Chicago.

            But I won’t be gone. In fact, far from it. I’m still around, safe and happy. I just want you to know that you don’t have to worry about if I’m eating right or even eating at all. I can promise you that I’m very crafty when it comes to these things.

            I didn’t leave because of you or your mom. In fact, you two are what’s making it so hard to go in the first place. I always hated goodbyes, so I thought that this letter would suffice. You can share it with your mom if it helps. I want nothing more than for you two to be happy.

            I just had to get away. Sometimes, you have to drop everything, destroy every trace of yourself to start again. And that’s just what I did.

            I love you so much. And not like a girlfriend would, and not like a sister would. I love you more than you could ever guess. Honestly, I can’t believe it myself, so getting you to buy it would be even harder.

            Your mom was the best mother figure I’ve had my entire life. I thank her so much for that. I love her as well; she’s more of a parent than either my dad or mom.

            I just want the best for you guys. I truly believe that one of the best things for you to do would be to forget about me.”

            The letter ended there. I’d frantically looked for the rest, nearly tearing the book to shreds in my search. Finally, a small signature caught my eye on the back cover.

            It read, in the smallest damn print that she could make,

            “But hell, you’ve always been self-destructive. My phone number changed. The new one is written on the third page of this crummy thing, but don’t tell my parents that. – Emily.”

            I grinned, pulling my phone out of my pocket. I found the page, quickly reading off the number. My hands shook with excitement as I dialed; I held the phone to my ear with trembling fingers.

            It felt like it rang for hours. Finally, someone picked up. “Emily?”

            “Speaking.”

            I sighed a breath of relief. “Emily, it’s me. I found your note. I love you too, okay?”

            She chuckled over the line, replying, “I know. I always did.”

            And I couldn’t help but laugh along. Over all that she’d put me through, I laughed. Hell, I could’ve killed her had my hands been able to strangle through telephone lines. It was either I cry or I laugh, and it was easy to choose the latter.

            And I didn’t laugh because she was funny. I didn’t just laugh because I was glad to hear her voice again, but I laughed because in a way, she’d stayed. My Emily.

 

THE END.


End file.
